Zoom H2 appropriate for sound clips?

[paulchevin]

Originally Posted by Joseph Hanna

Hey Paul,

One of the things that interests me about the H4 is mobility. And specifically what I mean by that is the ability to get to another and ostensibly better sounding room. I have a Pro Tool HD rig but it's noisy in that room (at least for acoustic guitar recordings)

My thought process would be 1) build some click track rhythm in Pro Tools, load a stereo bounce of the guide track into the H4 and 2) then retreat to my kitchen which is a MUCH better sounding room to record acoustic guitar. 3) Dump the acoustic guitar tracks back into Pro Tools and continue to build the mix.

Thoughts??

I've never used the H4n like that, simply because I tend to play "freestyle" and therefore only record a single stereo track.

I don't see why it wouldn't work, although I think you might be limited to 16 bit with the MTR setting (I'm not certain about that) - not a problem for demos, but if you're doing serious work 24 bit is much better.

Fran commented on the noise floor. I have never found this to be an issue with the H4n. There is a little bit of noise when you record with the built in mics, but I have used a number of small diaphragm mics that are far noisier, even when used with a good quality preamp and audio interface.

I've found the H4n's preamps to be very quiet and I get a lower noise floor using them than I do recording with my Focusrite Saffire, which is considered to be a very good interface. The other advantage, of course, is that you don't get any computer fan noise with the H4n!

Paul